


Make the Wounded Whole

by word_docs_and_willowboughs



Series: Four Thousand Winter Thought She Not Too Long [2]
Category: Lymond Chronicles - Dorothy Dunnett
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, F/F, Hidden Injury, Hurt/Comfort, Lymond is a lady, Pre-Book 1: The Game of Kings, Pre-Series, Rule 63, post-galleys
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-30
Updated: 2019-12-30
Packaged: 2021-02-27 16:01:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 738
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22029751
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/word_docs_and_willowboughs/pseuds/word_docs_and_willowboughs
Summary: (For a pair of prompts from user sshysmm: "why are you shaking" / "take off your shirt" )Margaret gets Lymond off of the galley ship she's been trapped on and brings her back to her home. Once there she discovers an injury Lymond has been hiding and attempts to help.
Relationships: Francis Crawford of Lymond and Sevigny/Margaret Douglas
Series: Four Thousand Winter Thought She Not Too Long [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1585696





	Make the Wounded Whole

**Author's Note:**

> This is set in an alternate universe where Lymond and some other characters are women.  
> Francis = Frances

“Why are you shaking?” The words sounded like more of a demand than Margaret had intended, and she only realized it when Frances pulled away sharply from the tight embrace and then hissed through her teeth without answering. They’d barely been alone in one of many spare rooms in the Lennoxes’ opulent home for a few moments before Margaret had finally let herself act on the impulse she’d had since seeing Frances at the docks and hold her. 

Selfishly, perhaps, she’d thought Frances would be glad, for Margaret’s having saved her, for her lending her traveling cloak to keep her warm and covered better than before, for speaking well of her to Margaret’s new husband in spite of everything that had happened two years before. For offering her a refuge and safe haven when by rights she should still be a slave, or at most a fugitive. Instead Frances was evasive, every movement ginger and precise, and unwilling to be so close as Margaret wanted to out of sheer pity; surely no one could have held her like this in the time they’d been apart. It was only after Frances freed herself that Margaret noticed the tremors, and saw that the care with how she held herself had the same cause: under the cloak where her hands had pressed over Frances’s shoulder blades, one palm had come away sticky. Margaret swept the cloak from her shoulders and before Frances could catch it got a glimpse of her back, plainly bleeding through the linen shirt. Frances’s eyes flashed with something like anger, or perhaps a memory of the time Margaret had last revealed a hidden truth about her by getting far too close. 

“Frances.”   
“It’s nothing.” She was no longer looking at Margaret, the translucent lashes hiding her eyes as she stared at the floor, her mouth a firm and unforgiving line. “Perhaps, my lady, you would leave me to rest?”   
“You are bleeding. Have I hurt you?”   
“Not nearly so much as the boatswain,” Frances answered, the usually musical voice dull and muted. “I will mend. Faster if you are more gentle in your affections.” Margaret did not believe her for a moment. This was just one more evasion in a day which had told her without a doubt that Frances had changed, more than Margaret would have imagined possible.

“Take off your shirt,” said Margaret quite suddenly. “Let me see.” Frances looked at her with genuine surprise and said slowly,  
“I had thought… perhaps I might take fewer orders here.” She did as she was told though, or tried to. She’d crossed her arms with the edges of the fabric in her hands but only got halfway through drawing the shirt up over her head before she gasped and stilled. Margaret could see just enough of her injuries to realize that she needed help and wordlessly assist her. 

She guided Frances to sit on the edge of the bed and turned to one side to assess the damage done. There was plain evidence of a whipping— from the boatswain, Frances had said — not yet healed over properly, wounds that must have broken open again some ways at the force of her embrace and Frances’s reflexive reaction. The sight of the blood was surreal, but it was the raised brand on her right shoulder, the Fleur de Lis marking her a criminal for life, that made Margaret flinch.  
“Betrayal of the English crown has its consequences, as you well know,” said Frances as Margaret’s hand hovered over it briefly, and laughed almost inaudibly, the only sound bitterness. Then she ducked her head, as if abashed. “Forgive me. I should not…” 

“You should be grateful?” said Margaret, and Frances opened her mouth without speaking. “Our late king expected gratitude of me when I was let loose from the Tower; I had none that day. Do you think me wicked for it?” Frances shook her head once, sharply, and Margaret laid a hand over hers. “I expect nothing from you but to rest. I…” she swallowed. “I’ll find help.”   
“No,” said Frances, no louder but firm and decisive.   
“Water, then, and bandages, if you won’t see someone else.” Frances declined her head, refusing resolutely to look at Margaret.   
“Do what you must,” she said. It was only as Margaret rose to leave that she heard, “Thank you,” from behind her, and for the first time since they’d started speaking, smiled.


End file.
